"Yes! Yes!" assented I, scanning eagerly the point behind us. And Marc said:—
"Very great is your sagacity, my Tamin. The Black Abbé fooled himself when he forgot to take you into his reckoning!"
At this speech the little wrinkles gathered thicker about Tamin's eyes. At length, deeming us to have gone far enough to catch the loom of the land, as it lay for one watching from the sand-spit, Tamin altered our course, and we ran up the basin. Just then we marked two canoes rounding the point. They were plainly visible to us, and I made sure we should be seen at once; but a glance at Tamin's face reassured me. The Fisher understood, as few even among old woodsmen understand it, the lay of the shadow-belts on a wide water at night.
Noiselessly we lowered our sail and lay drifting, solicitous to mark what the savages might do. The sand-spit was by this so small that from where we lay it was not to be discerned; but we observed the Indians run their canoes upon it, disembark, and stoop to examine the footprints in the sand. In a moment or two they embarked again, and paddled straight to the point.
"Shrewd enough!" said Marc.
"Yes," said I, "and now they'll track us straight to Tamin's creek, and understand that we've taken the boat. But they won't know what direction we've taken!"
"No, M'sieu," muttered Tamin, "but no use loafing round here till they find out!"
Which being undoubted wisdom of Tamin's, we again hoisted sail and continued our voyage.
Having run some miles up the Basin, we altered our course and stood straight across for the northern shore. We now felt secure from pursuit, holding it highly improbable that the savages would guess our purpose and destination. As we sat contenting our eyes with the great bellying of the sail, and the fine flurries of spray that ever and again flashed up from our speeding prow, and the silver-blue creaming of our wake, Marc gave us a surprise. Thrusting his hand into the bosom of his shirt he drew out a packet and handed it to me.
"Here, perhaps, are the proofs on which the gentle Abbé relied!" said he.